The letter came from the other University. I half heartedly opened it. Not in a million years would I be accepted. Not I, not I who could not read until college, not I who still could not spell, who had such a slow start, who never succeeds at much at all, who seems to always be a day late, dollar short, and behind everyone in what needs to be remembered.
I had joined the Army Reserves in 1974 and could not seem to get beyond E5. Because of all the memory work I was always at the bottom of the pile. I was in a Hospital Unit as a Social Worker and I seemed to fail or barely make it on most common military tasks such as uniforms and shinny boots and shortcut vocabulary. I couldn't even march correctly. In the current unit someone had put me in a permanent KP position because I had complained that a medic in the local hospital had left a needle in the pillow of a semi-comatose elderly man weighing almost 200 lbs. Why I alone was given total care of him, when I weighed only 128 and others had partners to care for much less heavy patients, should of been my first cue that someone was sabotaging me. It took me finding the right senior sergeant to stop the prank.
So, if I was that bad at politics, how was I going to go to a Ph.D program. I opened the letter reluctantly. I was floored, I was accepted. Little did I know that a Ph.D program has tons and tons of politics. What I had experienced in the Military was child's play. But unknowingly I decided to go for my Ph.D.
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